confidence vs. cockiness

1. a busy day in the lab and a semi-exciting one too. the professor i'm working for and the lab team i'm working with are both really doing their best to make my summer worthwhile. i believe at the end of this summer i will have several thank you notes to write (perhaps i should start a list now...).
2. gave myself a pedicure today. sparkly red polish to match the upcoming holiday. i'm going home for the 4th of july and can't wait to see my family/mountains/boyfriend/friends/kitty.
3. onto sex and the city season three! i love aiden! yay! too bad i know how this whole series really ends up...with her marrying big and then kissing aiden and then staying with big. bummer!

ego--what's the deal? i mean, i get being confident, but why the need to be an asshole? and the only thing conceiving this post is the tv show chopped, no interpersonal life crisis. anyway, some people are so egotistical and arrogant. trust me, i've had my fair share of those guys (and girls) in my life. still do, for that matter. but i'm not saying that i'm not an ego maniac sometimes, especially when my ego is bruised. but i've also always seen excessive ego as a defense mechanism for low self-esteem (or something psychological like that). i always get the most testy and arrogant when i'm feeling either really legitimately proud of something i've done or really bruised from something not-so-good that i did. but some people just have over-reactive egos! like, get over yourself already! maybe if you didn't have such a massive ego then doing poorly every now and then wouldn't come as such a shock. everyone screws up sometimes. but don't whine about it and just get back up and get back to life. while i'm writing this, i am (obv) thinking of samantha from sex and the city. talk about ego. then again, girl can back it up. and she can also accept defeat and loss of dignity (on those rare occasions when things happen to her). okay...that's not entirely true. she fights and doesn't take shit from people, but after all of that, she can still take a punch to the ego every now and then. unlike this chef on chopped! don't put all your eggs in one basket.